8 free Photoshop brushes you need right now

When it comes to emulating analog art mediums, there’s rarely a better option than Photoshop brushes. Brush sets are essentially collections of high resolution scans of real life brush strokes, which are then converted to brush tools that a user can install in Photoshop and utilize in a similar fashion to stamping.

The following images are custom samples I’ve created from eight hand-picked, free Photoshop brushes you can download! Enjoy.

1. Acrylic Photoshop brushes
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A good starting point is to install a simple acrylic paint brush set. This set does a nice job of capturing the wispy qualities of dry brushing with acrylic paint.

Use this on business cards for companies with down-to-earth sensibility, in website backgrounds with a hand-made vibe—or use your imagination to think of any number of creative uses!

2. Colored pencil brushes
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Colored pencils are notorious for bringing light hearted joy and mind melting color blending. This free Photoshop brush set is great for child-oriented designs, happy flyer or poster backgrounds and any other fun, youthful designs.

3. Pencil brushes
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Graphite is an art medium with inherent roughness and texture. These Photoshop brushes have the ability to give a design a harder edge or sophistication. It makes me think of new-age sushi restaurants or suit tailoring. Use your imagination to find an appropriate context to bust out this brush set!

4. Charcoal brushes
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Similar to the pencil brush set, this charcoal brush set offers a slightly wider range of texture, which can be helpful in molding these black-and-white edgy brushes to a variety of different style sensibilities. Think business card backgrounds, landing pages, brochures or even flyers.

5. Splatter watercolor brushes
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Perhaps on the slightly less realistic side of the spectrum is the splatter watercolor brush set. This one is definitely “in-your-face,” yet retains a positive and energetic vibe. Think extreme sports, arts and craft sale or music festival.

7. Spray paint brushes
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No set of free Photoshop brushes would be complete without the classic drip spray paint. This particular set does a nice job of capturing some of the “fuzz” surrounding the outside of a given spot. This brush set would come in handy for “street” oriented contests, extreme sports or even dance-related designs.

8. Drip spray paint brushes
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Finally we end with an extra drippy spray paint Photoshop brush set. While this set definitely delivers strong with the drips, it also comes with it’s own unique style of “debris” surrounding each spot.

Again, consider this for sports related contests, street art or even utilize it creatively for splatter style background textures.